dead; Regier had been set free by the Shiite militia; and Jeremy Levin had escaped to the Syrians. The six remaining hostages had been in captivity for better than a year and a hall — a very long time.
We wanted them back, very badly.
When I left Beirut, never did I imagine that I would return again. But in September 1985, I found myself with a Special Operations Task Force at a location in the eastern Mediterranean, prepared for a hostage rescue attempt. We had intelligence information indicating there might be a release of all the hostages. My orders were to set up a mechanism for their pickup and covert return to the United States. We were also prepared for a rescue operation, in case something went wrong.
We did not know the actual release point, except that it would be somewhere in the vicinity of the American University in West Beirut.
At midnight on September 14, 1985, the streets were vacant near the American University. A car pulled up, the back door opened, and a man got out dressed in a running suit. The car sped away. The man was picked up by one of our operators, brought to a predesignated point on the beach, the proper code signal was sent by the operator, and a helicopter picked the two of them up and brought them back to an aircraft carrier over the horizon. When the helicopter landed, the Special Forces operator announced, 'This is the Reverend Weir.'
Reverend Benjamin Weir, an American missionary, had been held captive for sixteen months by the Shiite Muslims. Weir was fed a hot meal in the Admirals' Mess, then taken to the hospital bay in the belly of the ship, where he was given a complete physical examination (he was in remarkably good shape considering what he had been through) and held for the next three days while we waited for the release of more hostages.
When he was picked up, he had with him notes from other hostages for their families and a message from his captors for personal delivery to President Reagan. We did not look at any of these messages.
Three days later, the deal for the release of the other hostages had failed to materialize, and we were told to return Reverend Weir to the United States. Reverend Weir, dressed in a flight suit, was flown to a location elsewhere, where a C-141 was waiting to return him to Andrews Air Force Base.
Some months after that, the intelligence community located the building in West Beirut where the hostages were being held, and described it in sufficient detail to allow us to locate a similar building in the western United States. We modified this building to mirror the Beirut buildings interior, a rescue force rehearsed the mission, and an infrastructure was established in West Beirut to support the operation.
Then disaster hit.
Two weeks before the planned launch of the rescue attempt, the Hezbollah uncovered one of the agents with access to the building; he was tortured and killed. Before he died, he revealed the names of the other agents involved, who were also killed. It was assumed then that the hostages would be split up in various locations, and so the rescue attempt was scratched. There was never again sufficient credible intelligence to support a rescue attempt, but eventually the hostages were released.
Because such anarchic violence is blessedly beyond most Americans' experience, my countrymen seem to have had a hard time grasping the complexities that led to the factional fighting and ultimately to the destruction of Beirut. Maybe this story will bring additional insight:
In December 1983, as Colonel Tom Fintel was nearing the end of his tour as chief of office of military cooperation, General Tannous arranged a going-away ceremony, complete to the presentation of a Lebanese medal on behalf of President Gemayel.
Sporadic artillery fire made an outside ceremony unsafe, so Tannous decided to hold the ceremony in an officers' club on the top floor of the Ministry of Defense, overlooking the city. Only principal staff officers and brigade commanders were invited, along with wives, but wives were not expected to show up, because of the risk.
To my surprise, two wives — Christians — actually braved the shelling to attend.
I'd never met them before, but as soon as they entered the room, they came straight to me. Without even introducing themselves, one brought her face close to mine: 'Why don't you do something about this shelling that's killing our children?' she practically cried. 'You've got all those ships sitting out there, with aircraft carriers. Bomb the heathens that are destroying us.'
'We can't do that,' I said. 'The people who are shooting and shelling arc also Lebanese citizens. This is a Lebanese problem, and it has to be worked out by Lebanese.'
They came back at me with fire in their eyes. 'They arc not Lebanese citizens!' one said. 'They are nothing! They don't even have a soul.'
'We teach our children that they are born with a little black tail,' the other said. 'And it is their duty to kill them, pull their pants down and hack it off!'
Lebanon's wounds are cut deep. Healing that agony may require as many generations as it took to create it.
Two days after this ceremony, the Ministry of Defense was hit by an artillery barrage that destroyed the officers' club.
AND less than two years later, I was on my way to Sicily to deal with another hostage-taking, this time aboard the
IX
THE
Carl Stiner
As soon as we arrived in Sigonella early Tuesday morning, we began refucling the planes, but we would not take off until later that day, since we had to time our departure to arrive at about dusk at Cyprus (Cyprus would provide us with coverage of the eastern Mediterranean, and a base for the takedown of the ship, if that proved feasible). Meanwhile, we off-loaded the small contingent of SEALs and the two Little Bird gunships that would remain at Sigonella.
This ground delay proved useful, since it gave me my first opportunity during the mission to talk to my commanders face to face. We had lifted off from three bases in three states, assembled en route, and landed sequentially. Now, on the ground at Sigonella, I held a commanders' conference to talk about conducting the operation.
There were blessedly only three possible scenarios:
• First scenario: The ship remains on the high seas and in the vicinity of Cyprus. In that case, we could reach it from there and wouldn't need Navy platforms (ships) for staging and recovering our helicopters. Of the three scenarios, this would be the least complex for us, and would offer us the best conditions for success, since the terrorists wouldn't have a sanctuary, such as, for example, Iran, Libya, or Algeria.
• Second scenario: The ship finds a port somewhere. In this case our operation would be easy or hard depending on the cooperation of the host country. Yet, even if the host country consented to our operation, surprise would be difficult to achieve; we would have to be concerned about the territorial waters issue, and perhaps we'd have local police or military forces to deal with.
• Third scenario: The ship sails beyond the recovery range of our helicopters. In that case, we would need Navy platforms for recovery of our helicopters after our initial assault.
After the conference, I communicated these options to the Pentagon and USEUCOM. Then I talked with the U.S. commander at Sigonella, Bill Spearman, to find out if he had learned anything useful from his Italian counterparts, such as the Italian base commander. We also talked about support I might need when we returned. I knew this was prudent but, at the time, I was convinced it was unnecessary. We were focused on a takedown at sea and never imagined that the action would end up (as it did) back at Sigonella. In any event, I asked Bill to take care of my troops who'd remain at Sigonella and promised to keep in touch through my liaison team there.
